Oak Hill Homestead

Follow-Up Friday

2012-01-27T08:00:00.024-06:00

This week:

-- I worked at a cattle show on Saturday, taking entries and doing the record-keeping. It was a sunny but cold day and I was so cold inside the unheated arena. A friend loaned me a fuzzy red blanket.

-- We brought home the packages of beef from the butcher. The freezer is bulging; hubby actually taped the door shut so we won't worry about it popping open. I'll pressure-can some of it. The butcher also gave me 3 bags of beef tallow and said if I'll bring him an occasional bar of my soap he'll make sure I don't run out of tallow. I have enough goat milk in the freezer to keep me going for awhile...

-- We celebrated my birthday with a nice lunch over the weekend.

-- Then on Monday night, our middle daughter, son-in-law and granddaughter unexpectedly showed up on our doorstep! Our son had picked them up at the airport and brought them over to surprise us, and we were REALLY surprised! They are staying until Saturday morning. (While she was here, I gave her her charm bracelet.)

-- Our son-in-law helped hubby take down two sides of the old sheep pen one day. The old wire was disposed of, the t-posts went onto our pile of fencing supplies. This was Step #1 in preparing the hayfield for winter grazing by the horses.

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Thankful Thursday

2012-01-26T08:00:00.016-06:00

I am thankful to the Lord, my God, for:

- His grace and provision
- my family
- rain with thunder and lightning
- the starry, starry night: midnight black punctuated with silver stars, silent and still, chill and bare
- my granddaughter's hugs

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Charm Bracelets

2012-01-25T08:00:00.101-06:00

In honor of my birthday...

One of my "family treasures" is my charm bracelet.

It was a gift from my one and only aunt when I graduated from high school. The first two charms were a four-leaf clover for good luck on my graduation...

...and a typewriter because she was a secretary (in today's terms she was a high-powered administrative assistant) and I was working part-time as a typist in a legal office. (Yes, I learned to type on a typewriter, not a keyboard. A manual typewriter, ie non-electric.)

Some of the other charms are baby photos of my children, places we've lived and traveled, and my district orchestra medal from 6th grade. I didn't mind that I had both silver and gold charms.

I was really horse-crazy as a child; this is from a birthday-gift necklace when I was around nine years old. There is an even tinier silver horse on the other end of the bracelet.

My aunt also gave me her charm bracelet, which was sterling silver with silver charms. She particularly liked the little silver treasure chest that opened. She said she used to put notes from her school friends inside of it, folded into very tiny shapes. Sadly, this bracelet was stolen from my jewelry box on one of our many military moves. My aunt and I were both heartbroken.

I began keeping charm bracelets for my daughters when they were young. They included a baby photo charm and some travel charms.

For some reason I still have my middle daughter's bracelet. The oldest and youngest have theirs.

When my brother and I cleaned out Dad's house after he died, I found this bracelet that was my mother's. It has a tiny B, her initial. I don't remember seeing the bracelet before and I don't know what significance the charms represent; I wish I did. Obviously, from the kind of chain she used, she made it during the 60's or 70's. (That happy face is iconic 70's!)

I haven't added to my charm bracelet in well over a decade. Somewhere I have charms with my granddaughters' baby photos. I'm sure I could find some for other places we've lived and traveled.

To start with, this morning I added a little dog bone charm to represent Pete.

~~~~~

A Slice of My Life

2012-01-24T08:00:00.007-06:00

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What I've Learned

2012-01-23T08:00:00.006-06:00

Although most of these things had nothing to do with our barn fire, they are items I will consider in the future in my quest for fire safety. I thought I'd share them with you - I hope I can save even one person from heartache.

We don't know the cause of our fire. The fire chief said there wasn't enough left to determine the cause. He could tell us generally where it began, but that was all.

1. Although I was thankful to have electricity in my dairy barn, and hubby was sweet to have it put in for me, I will never again have power in a livestock building. Until the barn was finished, I milked the goats inside a shed without electricity, so I used a powerful battery-powered camping lantern at night. It worked just fine then, and it will work fine in the future. A window or two gives enough light during the day.

2. A friend told me that the safest way to run electricity in a barn is to run the wiring through metal conduit. (If you want power, this does sound like the ideal method.)

3. I will not store hay and feed in the same building with my animals. Our fire didn't start on the side of the barn where the hay was stored, but hay is of course highly flammable.

4. Cobwebs and dust are flammable. It's a never-ending battle, but it's worth the time to clean often.

5. I will have a fire extinguisher in the barn from now on. I'm not sure where I would put it to be out of reach of the goats, but I will figure it out. It would not have made a difference in this case - we couldn't get inside the barn - but in some other situation on some other day it might be needed. Just like you keep an extinguisher in your kitchen, put one in your barn.

6. I will also make sure that the barn has multiple exits in strategic places. For instance, my feed room was in the back corner of the barn, 30 feet from one door and 40 feet from the other. What if I had been in there and unable to get out? I shudder to think about that. There should have been an outside door there, or at least a window.

7. And of course, location is important. A house or barn in the middle of the woods is pretty, but fire officials will tell you to have a defensible space around your building that is clear of trees, dry grass, and brush.

Stock photo

For more tips on structural fire safety, visit Wildfire Safety, or google "prevent barn fires".

~~~~~

Silver Sunday

2012-01-22T08:00:00.001-06:00

Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is noble,
whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely,
whatever is admirable — if anything is excellent or
praiseworthy — think about such things.
Philippians 4:8 (NIV)

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Friday Follow-Up

2012-01-20T08:00:00.023-06:00

This week:

-- I've posted photos of the day-after-the-fire on a static page, rather than a regular blog post. This way, if you want to look at them you can, but if you'd rather not, they're not in the regular blog feed.

-- As I wrote on Monday, several friends came to help us move the metal and other wreckage from the fire on Saturday. I am so thankful for their help. It is easier to deal with now that it is "organized" into piles, even though those piles are still in sight when I walk out the front door. As soon as the insurance adjustor comes, we will be able to get rid of the evidence of the fire.

-- It still smells like smoke.

-- I moved the bucks to a small pen that had been behind the barn, because we were expecting cold weather and the shed in that area is much more weather-tight. I used to use it for moms with young kids. It has taken me aback more than once to come out the door and hear the bucks make noise, knowing that the girls are gone. I am slowly getting used to that.

-- Pete has shifted his attention to the horses, trying to make them go into their stalls FAST when it's feeding time. He could move the herd of goats as a group, but the horses just don't work that way. He's trying though.

-- I've come down with a cold and am feeling rather miserable. I don't get sick very often.

~~~~~

Thankful Thursday

2012-01-19T08:00:00.008-06:00

I am thankful to the Lord, my God, for:

- friends that helped us clean up the fire wreckage
- those who have been holding me up in prayer
- a gift from a friend
- cardinals, bright spots of red in the drab winter landscape
- that our two youngest are doing so well in their quest for higher education

~~~~~

Making Vinegar

2012-01-18T08:00:00.007-06:00

Repost

Several weeks ago I started some pear vinegar, using peels and cores that were left from the many pears I canned last fall. I froze the peels/cores in quart-size zippered bags to make juice for jelly, but decided to use some to make vinegar.

Here is a recap of the directions:
Put the fruit in a clean jar, cover with filtered (non-chlorinated) water, add sugar (1/4 cup to a one-quart jar), and cover loosely. It works best if you can add some raw vinegar such as Bragg's Vinegar. Set in a warm place, and stir daily.

If you plan to buy Bragg's Raw Apple Cider Vinegar for this purpose, look at all the bottles on the shelf and choose one that has "mother" in the bottle, or has the most sediment in the bottom. You can usually find Bragg's in your local health food store if not in your supermarket.

I used a half-gallon jar and 1/2 cup of sugar. I added some mother-of-vinegar and the rest of the plum vinegar from my last batch.

It began "working" almost immediately - it reminded me of sourdough starter. When I took the cover off daily to stir it, to my surprise it was bubbling and obviously fermenting just like it's supposed to. This is the first time I've had mother-of-vinegar to add, and what a difference it's making. A little vinegar fly discovered it too. This is why you cover it with something that will let air in, but not the little flies. A thin hankie works well. I put the hankie over the top, then screwed on the canning ring to hold it in place.

After a few weeks, the appearance of the fruit had changed dramatically. I'd stirred the jar of vinegar each day to incorporate air, just like my sketchy directions directed. It smelled very vinegary; as I'd walk past the jar on the counter I often caught a strong whiff of vinegar. The fruit had disintegrated too. It was no longer recognizable as peels and pear cores; instead it was a kind of mush. I don't know if this is the action of the working vinegar, or if it's because the fruit was frozen.

The bubbling had stopped so it was time to remove the fruit. I poured it through a strainer into another clean jar, put a clean hankie over it, and will let the flavor develop for another week or two. The mushy fruit went onto the compost pile.

You make towers of strainers and things too, don't you? The top strainer would allow liquid to spill out the sides, so it is inside a Tupperware pasta strainer, which is inside a canning funnel. It's a little tippy, but it works.

After a couple of days the solids have settled to the bottom. There is about an inch of sediment in the bottom of the half-gallon size jar, fruit mush that went through the holes in the stainer. In a couple of weeks I'll pour the finished vinegar into a pretty bottle and strain it through a cloth to get a clear liquid.

Part One - Starting the Vinegar

Part Two - {this post}

Part Three - Finishing the Vinegar

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A Slice of My Life

2012-01-17T08:00:00.003-06:00

We "inherited" a lot of old junk and
rusty farm equipment when we bought Oak Hill.
This was a John Deere seed drill.

Linked up to Sweet Shot Tuesday

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Workday

2012-01-16T08:00:00.038-06:00

What used to look like this:

See the barn raising here

now looks like this:

On Saturday some of my 4H girls, their families, and friends from my trail riding group came to help clean up. We moved bent metal, picked up burned and melted junk, and pulled up the brick floor in the workshop corner. The youngest helper was 8 years old, but she worked hard carrying found tools and bricks to one pile or another, and picking up nails and screws.

It was amazing to realize that plastic melts into nothingness. There were a few hunks of solidified plastic goo, but so many buckets and other items were just gone without a trace.

Random, unidentifiable, melted metal objects.

Hubby's aluminum extension ladder is now a few hunks of shiny melted metal:

This piece is less than a foot long; there is a matching piece, both found where the ladder should have been, so I am sure they are all that's left of the ladder. I couldn't help it, I had to look it up: aluminum melts at 1,220°F.

I think these two buckles were from the horse blankets that were stored in a bin.

I had one very tough moment, but for the most part I was able to work alongside everyone else. Having people to talk to really helped. It kept my mind occupied.

I told my 4H girls that I now have a barn safety list and I will be inspecting their horse barns.

The relatively flat and straight metal siding will go to the home of one of the 4Hers to fix up their horse barn. Her mom says it needs some serious help, such as "new" metal on the roof to cover the holes. The bent and warped metal will hopefully be recycled as scrap, once our flatbed trailer is up and running again or we find someone who will haul the scrap away for us.

Thank you to all who helped; I am so grateful for your help.

~~~~~

Silver Sunday

2012-01-15T09:16:00.000-06:00

I can do all things through Christ Who strengthens me.
Philippians 4:13 (NIV)

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Friday Follow-Up

2012-01-13T08:00:00.029-06:00

This week - oh, what a week!

-- Hubby's doctor said he did suffer a mild heart attack when he went to the ER a week ago. It's a warning sign we will take seriously.

-- The fire. I still can't think about losing my does. I hope you all understand that I can't talk about it yet.

-- Tuesday the rubble was still smoking. Even though it rained most of the day we still noticed smoke, so we bought a sprinkler (the hardware store was just putting them on the shelves when we walked down the aisle) and another hose to replace what we'd lost. When we notice smoke, we run the sprinkler for awhile.

-- Chuck went to the butcher as scheduled. Now we have one less mouth to feed, which is a good thing after losing nearly all our hay in the fire.

-- Thank the Lord, my truck is working well after the "fix". The mechanic had told me that it might not, it might need a new transmission. I am so very thankful that it is running well. Hubby has ordered a new headlight lens to replace the one that melted from the fire's heat.

-- Thursday the goats were laid to rest. Hubby dug the hole Wednesday night with the tractor, although I continued to dig for several hours on Thursday. It was therapeutic; I needed to. Cheryl, her husband and her son came over, and while Cheryl and I went off out of sight, her menfolk found them all and buried them. I know this is the first step in my being able to deal with this.

-- I have been so very blessed and humbled by your comments and your prayers. Thank you. You honestly don't know how much you are helping me to heal from this.

-- We were left with one round bale. It was singed and wet on the outside, but inside it's good enough to feed the horses and bucks. We also had some loose hay in a shed that we'd cut by hand in our hayfield. Along with the rest of Oklahoma, I'm praying for an early, wet spring.

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Thankful Thursday

2012-01-12T08:00:00.017-06:00

I am thankful to the Lord, my God, for:

- Hubby suffered only a small burn on one hand while fighting the fire with the garden hose until the fire department arrived
- our volunteer firefighters
- our neighbors, who all came to help when they saw the smoke, and one who brought us a bag of creep feed so the horses would have breakfast in the morning
- prayers that are lifting me up and keeping me going
- a phone call from our young granddaughter

I am so thankful for all of you. Thank you for your sympathy and your prayers. Your comments have lifted me up, and made me cry anew. Thank you for sharing your hearts with me.

Give thanks to the LORD, for He is good;
His love endures forever.
1 Chronicles 16:34

~~~~~

Vacuum-Sealing Jars

2012-01-11T08:00:00.017-06:00

Repost

My kitchen is filled with jars... canning jars as well as recycled jars from spaghetti sauce and mayonnaise and more.

I use gallon-size jars as canisters for different flours, sugar and so on. The smaller jars ~ half-gallon size and smaller ~ hold pasta and rice and other dry goods. Others hold dehydrated foods such as chopped onions, peppers, and sliced mushrooms.

All but the gallon-sized jars are vacuum-sealed to ensure freshness and prolong storage life. I use my Food Saver to seal the jars.

Canning jars are sealed using the canning jar attachment. To use it, just place the top on the jar ~ you don't need the ring to hold the top on ~ then set the vacuum seal attachment on top, and press the "Start" button on the vacuum sealer appliance. I put the jar ring on after it's sealed, but I don't tighten it because it could break the seal. It just looks nicer that way to me, like a canning jar is "supposed to look". There are two different canning jar sealers, one for regular mouth jars and one for the wide mouth jars.

The recycled jars are sealed using a different method. As long as the jar lid has a "rubber" ring inside, it can be vacuum-sealed. In the photo above, you can see this white ring inside the jar lid.

To seal this kind of jar, tighten the lid on the jar and place inside one of the vacuum canisters. They come in a set of three; I choose the canister closest in size to the jar. Attach the hose attachment, and push the "Start" button. The vacuum sealer evacuates the air from inside the jar and from inside the canister too. When it's finished, press the button on the canister and open it. The jar inside is now sealed.

The last step is to label all my jars; I don't depend on my memory! Hot peppers can look identical to sweet peppers; chopped red peppers look amazingly like chopped carrots.

Store your jars in a cool, dark place for maximum storage life.

My vacuum sealer gets used a lot, so it has a place of honor on my counter. The canisters and the canning jar attachment are stored in the cupboard directly above it, with the hose inside one of the canisters. Everything is handy and easy to find, so it's simple and quick to seal a jar or a vacuum bag.

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A Slice of My Life

2012-01-10T15:33:00.001-06:00

I'm guessing that you don't want to see photos of the actual remains of the barn, so I won't post any unless I'm asked to.

This is what happens when you park too close to a barn fire.

And this. We won't be using this to go buy hay for awhile, I guess.

This was my comfort yesterday. These two magnets are hanging in my horse trailer's little tack room. My brother encouraged me with this first verse when I told him about the fire Sunday night.

I'm clinging to this one:

Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding. Proverbs 3:5

~~~~~

2012-01-09T08:00:00.035-06:00

This is a far cry from the post I had planned for today. I was going to talk about how excited I am for goat kids to arrive, and that kidding is less than two months away.

Instead, I have to report that yesterday our goat barn burned to the ground. I lost 9 does, all pregnant, 5 doe kids, and my registered buck. They'd been put away in the barn for the night.

When our neighbors saw the smoke, they came to help while we waited for the fire trucks, but nothing could be done except use the garden hose to try to keep the fire from spreading.

The other two bucks were in another pen and are ok. The horses were in the pasture. One of the two yard dogs was missing for several hours but she did show up. The barn cats have come back one by one from wherever they were hiding. We also lost our hay, and all the feed that was stored in the barn.

It's painful for me to talk about, so I'm just going to end this post here.

~~~~~

Silver Sunday

2012-01-08T08:50:00.000-06:00

Be joyful always; pray continually;
give thanks in all circumstances,
for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.
~ 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 (NIV 1984)

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Friday Follow-Up

2012-01-06T08:00:00.024-06:00

This week:

As you know, on Tuesday hubby ended up in the ER, but is fine. My truck ended up in the shop, and is not fine.

We've had absolutely beautiful weather this week. We need rain - we're still in a moderate drought and ended 2011 down by six inches - but I'm enjoying this while it lasts.

The electric company's tree trimmers came this week to give our place a manicure under the power lines. I warned them to be cautious of Chuck, but the foreman laughed and said the cow had been licking him earlier.

Do you have an Android or iPhone? You can download the app from "One Thousand Gifts"! Read about it HERE. If, like me, you don't have one, you can still take the JOY DARE.

My current favorite quote, from Funky Junk Interiors' blog:
"Go ahead and procrastinate for another whole year if you want to redo 2011 all over again." Ouch, that hurts, doesn't it???

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Thankful Thursday

2012-01-05T08:00:00.001-06:00

I am thankful to the Lord, my God, for:

- hubby is ok
- our mechanics, Kevin and Mark
- safe travel
- warm, beautiful winter weather
- my cat Tink

~~~~~

A Slice of My Life

2012-01-04T15:07:00.001-06:00

Linked to
Sweet Shot Tuesday
at m3b

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Simmering Potpourri

2012-01-04T08:00:00.004-06:00

Recently when the leaves fell off the apple trees, I found a couple of green apples on one late-ripening tree that I missed when I harvested. I peeled and sliced them very thinly and put the slices and the cores as well as the peels in the dehydrator.

I also had a few red apples in the refrigerator that were ready to be given to the chickens - in other words, a bit past their prime. I sliced them as well and into the dehydrator they went. This gave me a combination of red and green apple peels for some visual interest.

I had some dehydrated sliced ginger in the cupboard, some whole cloves in my spice drawer, and had recently bought a little jar of cinnamon sticks for another project, so I was all set to make the potpourri.

The mudroom, where I keep the dehydrator, smelled amazing while the apples were drying, like apple cider. When the peels were dry, I combined the dried apple pieces, broken cinnamon sticks, whole cloves, and a few slices of dehydrated ginger. (Peach peels and pits, and pear skins would also smell wonderful in potpourri. Use what you have!)

During the cold, dark and dreary days of winter, I put about a cup of this mixture into a pot of water simmering on the stove. It warms up the house with its rich scent and lifts my soul.

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A Slice of My Life

2012-01-03T08:00:00.045-06:00

No photos today, but here is a "slice of my life".

The first part of my day was spent in the dentist's chair.

The second part at the repair shop. I think I was blessed to get there from the dentist's office. I prayed the whole way and hit every stoplight green (all 3 of them). My truck has a serious problem and for awhile I will be wheel-less. Chuck might get a reprieve from the butcher on Monday.

And the last part of my day was spent at the ER with hubby. Six hours later they let us go. We grabbed fast food on the way home, very heart-healthy, don't you know.

In the dark, I put out a bale of hay for the horses and called them up the hill with a big flashlight. I've learned that by shining it down the hill in front of the barn door they'll come out to investigate, and amble up the hill. It looked like Chuck was out in the hayfield by the gate. I wasn't going down the hill in the dark though; he'll find his way back in on his own.

The goat barn has electricity so it was easier to feed them.

The stars were bright in the black velvet sky, and so pretty. A plane flew overhead, with the moon dimly lighting up the contrail.

I pray that tomorrow will be better.

~~~~~

Today

2012-01-02T08:00:00.011-06:00

"So teach us to number our days,
That we may gain a heart of wisdom."
~ Psalm 90:12 NKJV

Wishing you a blessed New Year!

~~~~~

Silver Sunday

2012-01-01T08:00:00.002-06:00

Now when Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judaea in the days of Herod the king, behold, there came wise men from the east to Jerusalem,

Saying, Where is he that is born King of the Jews? for we have seen his star in the east, and are come to worship him.

Matthew 2:1,2 (KJV)

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